Conferencing systems that allow participants to collaborate from different locations, such as for example, SMART Bridgit™, Microsoft® Live Meeting, Cisco® MeetingPlace, Cisco® WebEx, etc., are well known. These conferencing systems allow meeting participants to exchange voice, audio, video, computer display screen images and/or files. Some conferencing systems also provide tools to allow participants to collaborate on the same topic by sharing content, such as for example, display screen images or files amongst participants. In some cases, annotation tools are provided that allow participants to modify shared display screen images and then distribute the modified display screen images to other participants.
For example, SMART Bridgit™ offered by SMART Technologies ULC of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, assignee of the subject application, allows a user to set up a conference having an assigned conference name and password at a Bridgit™ server. Conference participants at different locations may join the conference by providing the correct conference name and password to the Bridgit™ server. During the conference, voice and video connections are established between participants via the Bridgit™ server. A participant may share one or more computer display screen images so that the display screens images are distributed to all participants. Pen tools and an eraser tool can be used to annotate on shared display screen images, e.g., inject ink annotation onto shared display screen images or erase one or more segments of ink from shared display screen images. The annotations made on the shared display screen images are then distributed to all participants.
In existing conferencing systems that allow participants to modify shared display screen images, the facility that detects and shares annotations is an integrated part of the conferencing systems. As a result, incorporating an annotation facility of an existing conferencing system into its upgraded or function-expanded version, or into a third-party conferencing system is generally a burden to system developers and system administrators.
As will be appreciated, improvements in conferencing systems are desired. It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a novel annotation method and a novel system for conferencing.